About Us

Mission Statement

Kadam Foundation strives to enable socially and economically marginalized social groups to access opportunities and resources for their holistic development in Canada, India and other countries.

Our priority groups

Adolescent girls from socially and economically disadvantaged sections of society, especially orphans and daughters of single women (widows, abandoned by their husbands and destitute) would be given priority. KF shall work towards their protection, empowerment, access to quality education and development al opportunities. Immigrants, refugees, international students coming in from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds, and differently abled persons would be some of the other priority groups.

Humanitarian Response

KF shall respond to natural and human-included disasters assisting the survivors in a humane and equitable manner. KF shall always engage with the most vulnerable groups who are likely to have inadequate access to relief and rehabilitation assistance.

The Framework of Values and Ethics

KF would be guided by the loftiest of Canadian ideals and democratic values in all its endeavors and pursuits as well as in its governance.

  • Restricting from engagement in any activity that is in conflict with law and human rights.
  • Restricting from engagement in any action that would undermine the dignity of any person or group of persons.
  • Restrict from using its resources and social capital in the furtherance of private individual interests.
  • Restrict from engaging in political activities.
Our Programs

Our Programmes in Canada.





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First Step Programme




The First Step Programme is designed to assist the international students (particularly from India and South Asia) coming into Canada for higher education and permanent residency to understand the multicultural, multilingual, multireligious and diverse social landscape of Canada and reiterate and imbibe the respect towards diversity that Canada fosters. The students are oriented on the history, culture, core values of Canada; work culture and environment, geography, environment and administrative institutions along with its policies, processes and procedures.

This programme also assists the students to learn how to access crucial information and skills required navigate their lives in the new country that they have come to live in. The students are helped to settle in, find appropriate residential accommodation and part-time employment and manage their studies well. Many of them require mental health interventions to deal with the culture shock and loneliness they experience; and hence the First Step Programme ensure round the clock counselling services for those students who need them. 

The LitClubs


A beautiful educational intervention designed and developed by LitWorld (www.litworld.org) the KF is gearing up to initiate LitWorld in underserved communities in Toronto.


LitClub is an in-depth literacy and empowerment program run once a week after school in small groups. LitClub members and their mentors come together in each session to share stories, build community, and develop as resilient changemakers and leaders. LitClubs cater to young people ages 7-14. Here, we collaborate with community to adapt the program to local needs, particularly with the mothers.

LitClubs provide safe spaces for girls and boys to explore how they have experienced the core strengths of Belonging, Kindness, Curiosity, Friendship, Confidence, Courage, and Hope in their own lives, and how they can use them to feel strong each day. In each unit of LitClub, one of these ideas is explored through stories mentors read to their LitClub members and stories that mentors and members share from their own lives.


Our Programs

Programmes we support in India




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Kadam Education Initiative

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As any other city, Ahmedabad, the megacity of Gujarat in India, also is paying its own human costs on the path to becoming a world-class megacity. While, on one hand, Ahmedabad is emerging as one of the growth engines of the country, attracting investments; it also has its share of poverty and displacement, rendering a large number of children vulnerable.

Education as the main strategy for enabling the children to realize their rights, KEI believes that one of the strategies to address this situation is to focus on their right to education. Conditions should be created in the community to enable the children to secure education. For this it is essential to work with their families, while also demonstrating a working model of quality education. The focus on education automatically brings in other rights that should essentially go with it - such as nutrition, health and protection.

Kadam Resource Centre for Girls (KRCG)

The most significant intervention of the Kadam Education Initiative (KEI) is the KRCG for adolescent girls (daughters of mothers who may have been divorced, widowed or deserted) vulnerable to trafficking and abuse. This intervention has been going on since 2012 and now it provides various educational, vocational and life-skill building opportunities to the girls who are selected for this program.

The Activities of KRCG

  1. Compilation of Learning Resources
  2. Upgrade the learning resources available. Training to effectively use online educational resources for knowledge and skill building.
  3. Remedial coaching and Livelihoods training: This would be based on the academic requirements of the students which would be provided by the teachers for English language, humanities, mathematics and computers. These teachers would assess all the new students to determine what kind of assistance they would require. The KRCG volunteers would also continue to take feedback from the teachers of these students during the PTA meetings.
  4. Counselling: This is a very crucial service that is offered in KRCG. The life situations from where the girls come in have a tremendous impact on their lives. It has a deleterious impact on their self-esteem, and destroys their confidence to learn, to make their own choices.Counseling helps girls to deal with the trauma of their past and present life, overcome their fears, understand their mothers and the familial as well as social pressures put on them, and thereby understanding how their life situation is determined by a patriarchal society.
  5. Life Skills, Developing Self Confidence
  6. Reproductive Health Workshops
  7. Workshops on gender, leadership development, effective communication
  8. Understanding and recognizing sexual abuse and harassment, and equipping girls to prevent and counter such occurrences.
  9. Workshop on legal provisions for the protection of women and justice in cases of violence against women.
  10. Personality Development
  11. Exposure visits and interaction with illustrious women role models Girls are taken to government offices, industries, shopping malls, restaurants and hotels, women’s police stations, banks and many other establishments, especially those where there are women officers and professionals. The other way of interacting and being inspired by strong women role models is when they are invited for various events such as International Women’s Day and the Day of the Girl Child.